OBABC: A one-dimensional binary artificial bee colony algorithm for binary optimization

Abstract

Artificial bee colony (ABC) algorithm is a widely utilized swarm intelligence (SI) algorithm for addressing continuous optimization problems. However, most binary variants of ABC (BABC) algorithms may suffer from issues such as invalid searches and high complexity when applied to binary problems. To address these challenges, we first establish a set of criteria for developing a BABC algorithm. Following these criteria, we propose a novel BABC algorithm, denoted as oBABC, which not only adheres to the defined criteria but also successfully inherits the advantages of original ABC algorithm. To evaluate the performance of oBABC and verify its effectiveness, experiments are conducted on two typical binary problems: uncapacitated facility location problem (UFLP) and maximum cut problem (Max-Cut). The experimental results reveal the following findings: 1) The validity of the criteria and the accuracy of the theoretical analysis are confirmed. oBABC exhibits high search efficiency with an invalid learning rate (ILR) of 0 %, while the ILRs of other BABC algorithms almost exceeds 20 %. 2) In terms of search efficiency and capability, oBABC exhibits a significant improvement in search efficiency and consistently ranks at the top in terms of optimization capability. These results suggest that oBABC may be a highly efficient and effective tool for solving binary problems.